When Laurence was apart from Julia and remembered her look of humility that asked for something she dared not state, he experienced an almost sickening pity for her. There was something in her suffering which he identified with his own. Yet he did not feel nearer to her in attributing their unhappiness in common to the futile and inevitable circumstances of human life. The pain of each of them, he told himself, was in realizing the isolation in which every human ultimately finds himself when he recognizes that his inner life cannot be shared. Laurence somehow exulted in seeing Julia forced to accept a condition of existence which had been plain to him for a long time. His despair was so complete that he imagined himself ready to abandon his defenses before her. But when he was actually in her presence she was only the thing that hurt him, and he was against her in spite of himself. Then her cruelty seemed monstrous, because she appeared to understand so little of what she had done. He knew that he bewildered her by showing no resentment toward Dudley Allen. Laurence despised her when she could not see the working of his pride that forced him to be superior to her lover's influence.
Often he said to himself, I'll go away. I can't bear it! But, while he believed in nothing outside himself, what was there to seek? He visited his parents more frequently. To be with them was a fulfilment of his humiliation. He would end where he was born, as every one else did.
Though he was certain that everything which developed through initiative was foredoomed to failure, his pride in Bobby increased. He wanted to keep his pessimism from contaminating his son. Bobby knew his power. When he encountered his father coming in from the laboratory alone it was a time to make a demand. "Hello, Dad! Say, Dad, am I too much of a kid to run a motor cycle? Jack Wilson says I can't run his motor cycle because I'm too much of a kid! Say, Dad, I've got some money saved up. Can't I buy me a motor cycle? I can run it. Honest, I can!" He had been playing in the street, his face dirty and smeared with sweat, his shirt torn in front, and his collar askew. His look was rapt and self-intent. He had the air of pushing his father aside to reach some hidden determination.
Laurence was self-conscious when talking to Bobby. He lowered his lids to conceal the too lenient expression of his eyes. "You're not an experienced mechanic, you know. Only have one life to lose. Better wait a while before you risk it."
Bobby stared with an intentness that obliterated his father's pretense. "Aw, say, Dad, honest, now! I've taken Jack Wilson's machine to pieces. I can run a motor cycle all right. Go on and say I can get it!"
Laurence glanced up, and his smile was hard and cautious, but when his face was averted his features softened immediately. "We'll see, son. I don't think a brat like you could get a license. Time to talk about it later." He put his hat on a hook and, turning aside, began to mount the stairs.
Bobby, vexed and excited, gazed after his father, regarding Laurence's hesitation as an annoying but inevitable formula which had to be gone through before one could get what one wanted. "Oh, gol darn it!" he said, and ran out into the street again. He tolerated his father.
Laurence wished that he had sent May away with Mr. and Mrs. Price, the parents of his first wife. They had recently gone on a trip to Europe. When they had asked to take Bobby with them, Laurence had resented it.
Julia met Laurence in the upper hall. "Did you tell Bobby to come in and dress for dinner? Isn't he a ragamuffin!" She smiled, imagining that her pleasure in Bobby pleased her husband.
Laurence smiled also, but coldly. He would have preferred to ignore her relationship to Bobby. It had come over him strongly of late that he must take Bobby away from the home environment. "I'm afraid I encourage him in the spontaneity of bad manners." He walked past her with an agreeable but remote expression that put her away from him.